Infection
by SaturnineSunshine
Summary: CB future fic. "She had nowhere to run. He had come for her and there was nothing else she could do about it. He took carefully measured steps towards her and from his haggard breathing, she could tell to the drop how much he had to drink tonight."


A/N: Just watching TV again and got inspired. Future-fic.

Summary: They both knew he was right and she had nowhere else to hide. She had nowhere to run. He had come for her and there was nothing else she could do about it. He took carefully measured steps towards her and from his haggard breathing, she could tell to the drop how much he had to drink tonight.

Disclaimer: All is GG.

* * *

"Have you ever had a passionate love affair?"

Eric looked up in surprise at his brother's question which he couldn't figure was rhetorical or not.

Chuck turned expectantly, his glass clenched in his hand and Eric knew where this was coming from. It was the third time and Eric knew the answer to the question. He knew why Chuck was asking and he couldn't understand why the older man couldn't leave well enough alone. Chuck saw the question in his eyes.

"You would know if you had one," he simply shrugged. He set down his glass carefully. Eric knew he was in one of his brooding states, something that came about all too easily nowadays.

"Like an inferno," he said, more to himself. "Like an infection that sears through your blood; wraps its tendrils around you, never letting you go."

"From what I could tell," Eric said carefully, starting to smell the inebriation on Chuck, "you weren't exactly complaining before."

He slight smirk lit Chuck's features. "That's the problem, isn't it?"

Chuck turned, something unreadable marking his features.

"I'm not even complaining now," he responded. "I should be. But that's what it does. It makes you insane. Makes you do things you wouldn't normally do."

"You shouldn't go," Eric advised, knowing form that sentence, exactly what was going through the tortured man's mind. "You know you shouldn't."

"I did," Chuck corrected. "But now... I don't know anything anymore."

"Don't you think this isn't really the most healthy of things?" Eric asked. Chuck let out a bark of laughter.

"Its not. I know its not."

"But you're going anyway."

"She never gave me a choice," Chuck said. "From the beginning, I never had a choice."

"So you're just going to..."

"Let the fever burn," Chuck nodded. "Yes."

* * *

Closing the door behind her, Blair dropped the keys to her penthouse on the table by the door when she realized that she wasn't alone. She stopped short, her hand poised in its position and she waited. She waited for the dark voice she knew would soon permeate the air.

"I knew you'd come home sooner or later."

"And I knew that doorman was too easily corrupted," Blair retorted shortly. At his harsh laughter, she turned in the darkness to see his silhouette by the window.

"Its true," Chuck agreed. "I didn't even need to bribe him. Just a name drop and here I am."

"I don't know why," Blair said slowly.

"Yes, you do."

And that was that. They both knew he was right and she had nowhere else to hide. She had nowhere to run. He had come for her and there was nothing else she could do about it.

He took carefully measured steps towards her and from his haggard breathing, she could tell to the drop how much he had to drink tonight.

"You know," she said, counting each step he took, "I don't have the habit of letting dangerous and inebriated men into my home."

"Dangerous?" he asked with amusement. "You must be talking about your other boyfriends... Oh wait..."

"I can't have other boyfriends when you're not even _one_ boyfriend."

"And what would he think?" Chuck sneered. "What would he think to know the very dark secrets you couldn't bare to tell him. The ones that you tell me."

"He's not here," she said softly.

"No," he agreed. "I am."

"Well you shouldn't be," Blair snapped. She couldn't have him here. Not here. Not now. He too easily breached her fortress.

"You never came to me."

So there it was. It wasn't her fault. It wasn't like she took joy out of scorning him like that.

"Something came up."

"Three times."

"Some _things_ came up," she amended.

"Like him?" Chuck asked coldly. "I do see how he could take precedence since he's known you longer."

His sarcasm was biting.

"Just because you've known me longer doesn't make this okay," Blair said icily.

"What?" Chuck asked coolly. "What we have? Because I can promise you that anything you had with him doesn't even compare."

"That doesn't make this okay," she repeated, even quieter now.

"Because he's safe."

It wasn't a question. They had this problem before. It wasn't easy. But being away from each other was harder.

"Why do you insist on resisting me?" he asked.

"I can't help it," she finally admitted. "Just like you can't help to keep coming after me."

"What else can I do?" Chuck asked. "What else can I do when you flee from me? What can I do but follow?"

"I don't know the answer to that," Blair replied. "I don't know the answer to anything anymore."

His breathing was close now. Whenever he was like this, she was caught unawares. Not because she couldn't see him coming. She always saw him coming. He was just unpredictable when he was drunk. He didn't know if it would be his vulnerable self... or his dangerous self.

"He's not here," Blair said again, knowing exactly the sort of revenge Chuck could enact on any one of them.

"No, he's not," Chuck said thoughtfully. "He's really not anymore. Is he?"

Their breaths mingled and Blair knew it was only a matter of time. That was the only thing that could convince her to turn away from his yielding body for hers. She had to turn away from his heat because she could feel his infection needling its way into her again. And then his ailment would surely have her for good. More than it did now. So much that she really wouldn't have a choice.

"You have to leave," Blair said loudly, trying to make it sound real in her ears.

"No."

"What do you have to gain here?" she practically yelled. "There's nothing here for you."

"I won't let this happened again," he responded with equal vigor.

"Is that what I am to you?" she asked acidly. "You have to prove yourself right? This is some game that you have to win? That you have to dominate?"

"I'm not letting you go," Chuck snarled. Her heart leaped and she knew she was afraid. He knew she was afraid. And they both knew how much that simple fact excited her in all the wrong ways. "I won't let him have you. Don't you think I wish I could control this? Don't you think I wish I didn't have to succumb to you so hard I don't know myself anymore? It would be so much easier. But I'm yours and that's the end of it."

In a twisted way, any other time she would have found a proclamation like that from him flattering. But right now, she just needed him out. He could have her in a second. If his mind wasn't so muddled he would understand that as well as he did when he was sober.

"Leave," Blair said, finally turning her back on him. It was only a moment for her to register his passionate _no_ when she heard the breaking of glass.

The whirled to see the stool that had been hurled into the mirror above the wet bar. Shards of glass littered the carpet as she looked into his dark, mesmerizing eyes.

Without even thinking, she crossed the floor and pulled him into her. As if expecting it, Chuck wrapped his arms around her waist as their lips melded together in a passionate embrace.

It was nothing. It was all nothing. The broken mirror was nothing. His heaving breaths were nothing. The boyfriend that hadn't mean anything at all to begin with was nothing. All that mattered was that they get underneath the layers of clothing that were barring what really mattered from each other.

They needed it. They needed the flesh on flesh and the searing fever of not being able to control what was around them.

Chuck knew that the man who tried to call himself her boyfriend had never even graced this bed. He knew this problem wasn't even a problem at all. He was easily disposed of and it was just the small itch of his presence that bothered Chuck.

What mattered now was that he was getting beneath her skin. He was feeling her heat and harsh breath hitting his neck. He knew this was it. She was it. He knew from the beginning he never had anyone like her. And soon after, all there was to him was her. There was so much fire he was an inferno. He was aflame and she was being consumed with him.

"Alright," she relented in uneven breaths.

"Alright?" he asked, knowing the answer to the question.

"Alright."

Alright they would still struggle. Alright they would push and pull and hurt each other. Alright she would be only his the way he was only hers.

And alright she would love him.

Alright she would let their infection flare.


End file.
